


I'd Save You The Choice

by ThereIsNoTragedyInThat



Series: The Place We Found Ourselves [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Boys In Love, Hurt Derek Hale, Hurt Stiles Stilinski, Implied/Referenced Torture, Kidnapping, M/M, Protective Derek Hale, Whumptober
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:53:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26783977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThereIsNoTragedyInThat/pseuds/ThereIsNoTragedyInThat
Summary: Stiles thought he knew what cruelty was.Of all the creatures they had fought since being swallowed into the world of the supernatural he never would have believed that the most barbaric of them would be humans.
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Series: The Place We Found Ourselves [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1947652
Comments: 3
Kudos: 147
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	I'd Save You The Choice

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Pick who dies

Stiles thought he knew what cruelty was.

Of all the creatures they had fought since being swallowed into the world of the supernatural he never would have believed that the most barbaric of them would be humans.

He tugged uselessly against the restraints holding him in place, the zip ties dug painfully into his skin, long since having broken through to leave his wrist slippery with his own blood. Stiles didn’t care, he still tried to break free, even as they seemed to get tighter and tighter and his hands had long since gone numb.

It was easy to drown in the helplessness.

The hunter, a woman with dead eyes and a wicked grin on her lips, moved closer to Derek, the wrench in her hand looking deadly. So many things looked like killing machines now, things Stiles never even would have thought of before ending up here.

He tried to scream. To get her attention off of Derek but his voice had long since become nothing but a hoarse cry, the painful rubbing of his vocal cords giving way to only the barest sounds. It wouldn’t have mattered, whenever Stiles got her attention off of Derek, he was quick to get it back.

When she clamped it onto his little finger and twisted with a harsh turn of her wrist, the snap of the bone was covered by Derek’s cry through clenched teeth. Stiles had the wherewithal to be grateful Cora had passed out twenty-minutes ago, had seen the agony in her eyes as she watched her brother steadfastly do everything, he could keep the torture away from her.

And it was torture.

There was no interrogation going on here. Not anymore.

At first the men who’d taken them had questions, about Scott’s pack, about their abilities, about Stiles’ spark or lack thereof. They asked about things that could have been easily discovered with a little bit of research, like the Hales’ past and then they asked about the creatures they fought.

The three of them said nothing.

Not once.

Not when they shot Derek up with a vial of mountain ash before curing him in the last moment, leaving him and Cora to beg. They didn’t give anything away, but they begged to die instead.

Not when they snapped Cora’s ribs with perfect placed punches, and she was left to heal painfully while Derek snarled, and Stiles tried to sooth her by rambling about the inanest things.

Not when Stiles was gripped by his throat and strangled until he lost consciousness to the sound of whining and growling filling his ears. He suspected the only reason he lived was because they did not hate him as a human, with the same fervor with which they hated werewolves.

The men had given up after the first day, they didn’t seem that desperate for answers and so they’d left them to the woman. So far, they only time her eyes had lit up with any real emotion, was when Stiles swore, he saw joy, while he passed out from a lack of oxygen.

Now, though, she was planning.

Stiles had seen the way she watched as she hurt them, saw her taking catalogue of their reactions and filing it away for future torture. She liked hurting Derek, but she liked his reaction to hurting them more…liked that he tried to get her attention, which made it all the stranger that she let him.

Until now.

She blew a heavy sigh as Derek continued to breathe harshly past the pain, “I’ve become bored.”

The words were said to no one in particular, her eyes having roamed skyward as she seemed to consider her next move. Derek’s eyes met his and he tried not to think about the apology in them, about the fact that this would be yet another thing he’d have to ease off of his shoulders, teach him to let go.

Stiles didn’t blame him.

Only a fool would.

“Its too bad she’s still out,” the woman murmured as she stepped closer to Cora’s prone form and Derek erupted into a hard snarl. “Easy boy. It might even be for the best.”

The hunter slipped a gun out of her pants, waved it in front of Derek who had grown still. Stiles himself felt his heart thundering in his chest at the sight because there was no way in hell, they weren’t wolf killing bullets in there.

“Choose.”

One simple word.

Stiles felt bile rise up his throat as he processed her too soft voice. 

She raised an eyebrow and repeated the words slowly like she thought he was too dumb to understand, “choose. The boy or your sister.”

Stiles first thought was how did they know?

In theory, this should be an easy choice, shouldn’t provide her with any entertainment at all because how could he choose his scrawny pack member over his little sister? Derek looked at him and Stiles felt his eyes sting because he wasn’t just some boy, they’d managed to knab in the process of getting the Hales.

“No,” the word came out strangled, broken. “No.”

Stiles felt blood rush in his ears and maybe he hadn’t really believed that they would get out of this alive because it had been two days and it might take another three before the pack found them…but this was the truth of it. He didn’t want to die but when he looked at Derek, the one thing he wanted more was to save him this kind of suffering.

He’d been through enough.

“Either” she shrugged. “You choose one or I shoot both.”

Derek was looking at him and Stiles couldn’t imagine the agony. He already knew that this would kill two of them anyway, Derek couldn’t survive this no matter who he chose, and Stiles couldn’t live with the guilt either if he lived while Cora died.

They were in this together, just like they’d always been.

It took effort, a lot of fucking effort, to offer Derek a wavering smile. He just wished he could do something about the tears snaking their way down his cheek, but it couldn’t be helped. Swallowing thickly, Stiles nodded, felt the bruising around his throat.

Derek was shaking, his own eyes filling with unshed tears, and Stiles knew this would only make things worse, but he needed to say the words, “I love you.”

The woman didn’t hear them, not with how raspy his voice was. Derek, however, had werewolf hearing and the steadiness of his heartbeat to tell him how much Stiles meant the words. His expression twisted and Stiles knew they’d never said the words, but he must have known that was how he felt for a long time since they’d finally got their heads out of their asses and began this tentative thing.

It had only been 6 months.

Stiles willed himself to be grateful for any time at all.

“It’s okay,” were the last words he was able to choke out and even though Derek hadn’t uttered a name, the woman walked over to him, that damn smile tacked on as she shoved the gun against his temple. “It’s okay.”

Stiles closed his eyes as a subvocal growl seemed to shake the entire room, the sound like a death rattle. He thought of his father and his mother, he thought of Scott and Lydia and all the friends who’d become his family and finally, he thought of Derek.

In his mind, he revisited the night before, before they were taken, and everything had gone so terribly wrong. He’d been so happy, curled around Derek, feeling too warm but too comfortable to move from where he was wrapped in his arms. It had been peaceful, Derek’s nose in his neck, laughing quietly while Stiles explained one of his and Scott’s childhood adventures and he’d thought…just for a second, that he could stay there forever.

The gun cocked and this time the entire room did shake, and Derek’s growl was joined by a myriad of others. He opened his eyes to find basement filling with wolves and the woman’s head being ripped from her body, her eyes still as dead as ever.

The cavalry had arrived.


End file.
